IMMIGRATION UPDATE – February 19, 2025
ALERT: DEPARTMENT OF STATE CHANGES CRITERIA FOR WAIVER OF IN-PERSON NONIMMIGRANT VISA INTERVIEWS
Since January 1, 2024 applicants who were previously issued a nonimmigrant visa in any classification (other than B-1/B-2), and were applying within 48 months of their most recent nonimmigrant visa expiration date, could request (and in some cases were mandated to select) a waiver of the in-person interview. Instead, the visa application could be made by mail/ drop box.
The U.S. Department of State has updated the categories of applicants that may be eligible for a waiver of the in-person nonimmigrant visa interview for certain categories of applicants. The eligibility criteria is now as follows:
- Applicants classifiable under the visa symbols A-1, A-2, C-3 (except attendants, servants, or personal employees of accredited officials), G-1, G-2, G-3, G-4, NATO-1 through NATO-6, or TECRO E-1;
- Applicants for diplomatic– or official-type visas; and
- Applicants who previously held a visa in the same category that expired less than 12 months prior to the new application.
To be eligible for an interview waiver, applicants must also meet certain criteria, including that they:
- Apply in their country of nationality or residence;
- Have never been refused a visa (unless such refusal was overcome or waived); and
- Have no apparent or potential ineligibility.
The eligibility change has been implemented with no notice. There are reports that applicants with drop box appointments for interview waivers have been turned away and told to schedule in-person interview appointments. This narrowing of eligibility for the interview waiver program is expected to significantly increase appointment wait times for in-person appointments. The interview wait times search tool has been discontinued and the global wait times have not been updated since early January.
Even when interview waivers are granted, please note that the interview waiver program is discretionary. Applicants may still be called for an in-person interview after a drop box submission, even if the post has not otherwise updated its interview waiver criteria. Applicants should plan international travel dates to ensure adequate time for visa renewal if necessary. We urge travelers to check post websites regularly for changes.
PUBLICATIONS AND ITEMS OF INTEREST
Know your rights. A number of organizations, including the Immigrant Legal Resource Center and Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc., have published resources highlighting immigrants’ rights in the United States, including “know your rights” information and what documents they may want to carry when traveling inside the United States. See also Information for Employers — “What to Do if Immigration Comes to Your Workplace”: NELP_EmployerGuide_Eng_2025_Final-.pdf. Note the important distinction between administrative and judicial warrants, and a public lobby versus private areas of a business.
HEADLINES
March Visa Bulletin Announces Retrogression of EB-4 Category, Religious Workers Expiration – The bulletin announces retrogression of the final action date in the EB-4/SR categories.
DOS Releases Employer Guidance on I-9 Reverification Process for Venezuelan TPS Beneficiaries – The Department of Homeland Security released guidance for employers on completing the Form I-9 work authorization verification form for Venezuelan TPS beneficiaries.
DOS Requests Public Comments on Passport Application Changes; Lawsuit Filed – The Department of State updated the application form to replace “gender” with “sex” and to request the applicant’s “biological sex at birth, male ‘M’ or female ‘F’.” A lawsuit challenging a related executive order (EO) and the passport changes argues that the EO is “transparently unlawful and unconstitutional.”
EOIR Issues ‘Core Policy Values’ Memo – The memo states that more guidance on the values of its “core mission” of “integrity, impartiality, and the decisional independence of its adjudicators” will be forthcoming and includes various admonishments against how the EOIR was managed before the current administration.
DETAILS
March Visa Bulletin Announces Retrogression of EB-4 Category, Religious Workers Expiration
The Department of State’s Visa Office has released the Visa Bulletin for March 2025. The bulletin announces retrogression of the final action date in the EB-4/SR categories, and warns that it may be necessary to make them “Unavailable” in “the coming months, possibly as soon as April. If the categories become “Unavailable,” EB-4/SR visa numbers will be available on October 1, 2025, with the start of fiscal year 2026, the bulletin states.
The bulletin also notes the March 14, 2025, expiration date for the employment fourth preference “Certain Religious Workers” (SR) category. “No SR visas may be issued overseas, or final action taken on adjustment of status cases, after midnight March 13, 2025. Visas issued prior to that date will be valid only until March 13, 2025, and all individuals seeking admission in the non-minister special immigrant category must be admitted (repeat, admitted) into the United States no later than midnight March 13, 2025,” the bulletin states.
The bulletin also lists, among other things, the diversity visa category rank cut-offs that will apply in March and April.
DOS Releases Employer Guidance on I-9 Reverification Process for Venezuelan TPS Beneficiaries
On February 5, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security released guidance for employers on completing the Form I-9 work authorization verification form for Venezuelan TPS beneficiaries.
The notice explains that employment authorization documents (EADs) with a Category Code of A12 or C19 and a Card Expires date of March 10, 2024, or September 9, 2022, associated with the 2021 TPS designation of Venezuela expire on March 10, 2025. “Employers must reverify 2021 TPS Venezuela beneficiaries who presented these EADs before they start work on March 11, 2025. Beneficiaries of the 2023 TPS Venezuela designation who presented an EAD with a Category Code of A12 or C19 and an expiration date of April 2, 2025, must be reverified before they start work on April 3, 2025,” the notice states.
DHS noted that it terminated the 2023 designation of Venezuela for temporary protected status (TPS). TPS and related benefits associated with the 2023 designation will end on April 7, 2025. That termination does not apply to the 2021 designation of Venezuela for TPS, which remains in effect until September 10, 2025.
DOS Requests Public Comments on Passport Application Changes; Lawsuit Filed
On February 14, 2025, the Department of State (DOS) published a 30-day notice requesting public comments until March 17, 2025, on changes to the Application for a U.S. Passport (Form DS-11). Among other things, to comply with Executive Order (EO) 14168, DOS updated the form to replace the term “gender” with “sex” and to request the applicant’s “biological sex at birth, male ‘M’ or female ‘F’.”
DOS said it also made “plain language changes” and revised the Acts or Conditions statement on the form to add an applicant statement “affirming that he or she is not required to register as a sex offender.”
On February 11, 2025, DOS said the agency “will no longer issue U.S. passports or Consular Reports of Birth Abroad (CRBAs) with an X marker. We will only issue passports with an M or F sex marker that match the customer’s biological sex at birth.” Passports with “X” for a person’s gender (sex) will remain valid until expiration.
On February 7, 2025, a lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts by seven people challenging the executive order and the passport changes. The complaint argues that the EO is “transparently unlawful and unconstitutional. It also is unmoored from scientific and medical reality: Transgender people, intersex people, and people who do not identify as either (or exclusively) male or female exist.” Plaintiffs seek a declaration that the passport policy and the EO as applied to passports are unconstitutional, a declaration that the passport policy violates the Administrative Procedure Act, and a permanent injunction. “Declaratory and injunctive relief are needed to remedy the many constitutional and statutory violations the Passport Policy inflicts. Relief is needed on a class-wide basis to prevent class-wide harm to the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of transgender, nonbinary, and intersex people in the United States who need a passport they can use without suffering harm,” the complaint states.
EOIR Issues ‘Core Policy Values’ Memo
On January 27, 2025, the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) issued a memorandum, EOIR’s Core Policy Values. The memo states that more guidance on the values of its “core mission” of “integrity, impartiality, and the decisional independence of its adjudicators” will be forthcoming but that EOIR’s “primary policy-formulating principle going forward will be to restore these values as the pillars of all of its activities.”
The memo includes various admonishments against how the EOIR was managed before the current administration and advises that EOIR employees “should not read policies obtusely or ridiculously, and all policies should be read with a modicum of common sense,” among other things.
The memo also states that “EOIR has reconstructed the Policy Manual as it was in effect as of January 2021 and will update it, as appropriate, once it is available online. To that point, the policies contained in the Policy Manual as of January 2021 are re-established as EOIR policies.”
A list of EOIR memoranda is available on EOIR’s website.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
IMMIGRATION AGENCY INFORMATION/PROCESSING TIMES
U.S. Customs and Border Protection:
Accessing I-94 Information: https://i94.cbp.dhs.gov/I94/#/home
Department of Labor:
PERM and Prevailing Wage Processing Times: https://flag.dol.gov/processingtimes
State Department:
Visa Appointment Wait Times: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas.html
Monthly Immigrant Visa Bulletin: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal/visa-law0/visa-bulletin.html
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services:
Processing Times: https://egov.uscis.gov/processing-times/
Case Status Online: https://egov.uscis.gov/
GOVERNMENT ENGAGEMENTS
DHS session on fee changes. The Department of Homeland Security will hold a virtual public engagement session on changes to immigration benefit fees made by a final rule. The session will be held at 2 p.m. ET on February 22, 2024. To register, input your email address at https://public.govdelivery.com/accounts/USDHSCIS/subscriber/new?topic_id=USDHSCIS_1081.
USCIS webinar on H-1B electronic registration process. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will present a webinar on the fiscal year 2025 H-1B electronic registration process on Wednesday, February 21, 2024, from 2 to 3:30 p.m. ET. The webinar will include updates on changes to the process, a step-by-step overview of how to submit an H-1B registration, and a Q&A session.
E-Verify webinar schedule: E-Verify released its calendar of webinars.
SAVE webinars: Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) has updated its calendar of webinars.
X (Formerly Twitter) ACCOUNTS
- EOIR: @DOJ_EOIR
- ICE: @ICEgov
- Study in the States: @StudyinStates
- USCIS: @USCIS
- Alliance of Business Immigration Lawyers: ABIL is available on X (formerly Twitter): @ABILImmigration
_________________________________________________________________________
This newsletter was prepared in collaboration with ABIL, the Alliance of Business Immigration Lawyers, comprised of twenty U.S. immigration lawyers who head some of the top immigration practices in the country. Larrabee Albi Coker LLP is an active member of ABIL.
Legal Disclaimer: This newsletter is provided for informational purposes only and does not substitute for legal advice based on the circumstances of a specific matter.